Trained Assassins
by Anthropologicality
Summary: Sam is working for a secret government agency. She believes everyone she knows to be dead. But when old friends show up, what does this mean for her? Kinda inspired by the show Nikita. Full summary inside.
1. Initiation

_Summary: When Sam is actually put in prison, she is taken by a secret government agency called Trained Assassins and spent years training to be an assassin. Now she has been given her first op as an agent: to take down an FBI team that knows a little too much. But she never expected Freddie to be an FBI agent, someone she thought was dead._

**New story! So I Googled "Seddie prompt," and it brought me to _Wishing Waters23_'s. It said something about Sam being an assassin, and now she's on her first mission, to take out an FBI team "that knew too much. But she never expected Freddie to be an FBI agent..." (And Freddie had to find out Sam was an assassin hired to kill him.)**

**I liked the idea (because badass Sam is always fun), but I changed it a bit, to make it more like the show Nikita. The characters I made up are sort of based on that, and I'm thinking Sam will be sort of a Nikita/Alex type of person, since Nikita fell in love and escaped "Division" (the name in the show).**

**Basically, Sam - Nikita/Alex; Freddie - Daniel-ish (I guess); Matthew - Michael; Hilary - Amanda; Walter - Percy. I think that's it.**

* * *

**Chapter One: Initiation**

Hilary strides into my room, her heels clicking on the tile floor. Hilary is physiologist, one of the people in charge here at T.A.—Trained Assassins, though our cover was Transfer of Archives—a top-secret government agency that "did the dirty work." She works for Walter, although really, we all do. He's in charge of everything, and he is ruthless.

"Sam, your presence is requested by Matthew in his office," Hilary tells me. I roll my eyes and push past her. Matthew had trained me here at T.A.—I've been training for almost a year now, and thanks to Matthew, I am a highly skilled soon-to-be-assassin. I haven't completed my training yet; officially, I was still a recruit. I had come here when I was sixteen. I was now seventeen. I remember the first day I got here:

_The first thing I remembered was waking up in a hospital bed at T.A. I didn't know where I was or how I'd gotten there._

_Matthew had been standing in the corner, waiting. It had kind of creeped me out that he'd been watching me. I sat up and brought my knees to my chest, hugging them. I was terrified. My eyes were red from having just woken up and from crying, though I didn't get how they could still look red from crying when I had cried so long ago._

_"Hello, Sam," Matthew had said. Then he raised his hand. "It is Sam, right? Never Samantha?"_

_"Never," I spat warily. "Or I'll kick your ass." My voice, surprisingly, sounded strong and brave, despite how scared I was. "Who are you? Where am I? Why do you know my name?"_

_"This is T.A.," he'd said. "I'll tell you what that stands for later, after I've shown you around a bit. My name is Matthew. I will play a big part in training you." He walked closer to my bed as he spoke._

_"Training me for what?" I asked suspiciously, lowering my legs. "And you still haven't told me how you know my name."_

_"We've been watching you," he said simply—which really made me think he was a stalker—and added mysteriously, "I'll tell you what we're training you for when I tell you what T.A. stands for."_

_"Look, you freak me out, stalker. You can't keep me here!" I yelled the last part. "I didn't do anything wrong!"_

_"No, you didn't. But I said we've been watching you, and we have. On that webshow of yours you did with your friend there—Catie, was it?"_

_"Carly!" I corrected, hysterical._

_"Right. Anyway, as I was saying, we thought you showed potential. Potential to be one of the best students here at T.A. You're here to see if we were right, which I'm pretty sure we were spot-on."_

_"What if you're not?"_

_"I don't think that will be a problem." He handed me a manila folder and told me to open it. I did, and it held a picture of a gravestone—a gravestone reading SAMANTHA PUCKETT, along with a certificate of death. I didn't even know they had those._

_"No. No," I stammered. "This can't be real. You're lying!"_

_He shook his head. "I'm not. It's all true, Sam."_

_I broke down. I couldn't help it. Carly, Freddie, and Spencer were all dead—or at least, there's no way they could have survived. Now this guy was telling me they were going to train me for something. It was all too much._

_So I ran. I swung my legs over the side of the bed and tried to make a break for it. Matthew grabbed my wrist and bent it back. I cried out in pain._

_"Let me go," I pleaded. "Just let me go and leave me alone."_

_"I can't," he said through his teeth. "You will stay here and train with us. And you will work for us," he snapped._

I both hate and like looking back on that day. I mean, look at how far I've come since then. I've been on missions, even as a recruit, and I've killed. As aggressive and abrasive as I was before T.A., as many people as I'd hurt, I'd never actually taken a person's life away from them. Not until August 8, 2010. There's nothing quite like pulling the trigger and watching a person's life drain away from them—it takes away a part of you every time, especially the first time, and I preferably kill as little as possible. Some of the others here, some of the agents who'd been here for years, could do it without batting an eye. But although I no longer hesitated, I always felt a little guilty; those were people, people with family, and friends. And I was taking it away from them. It was something I could never redeem. I tried my hardest to ignore the guilt. I was a killer with a conscience, something T.A. didn't want. They wanted someone who would kill ruthlessly, without even blinking.

"What does Matthew want?" I ask Hilary, stopping in the doorway.

She smiles; a smile that, paired with her piercing green eyes, appears cold and calculating no matter how friendly she tries to make it seem. "You'll see." I frown.

XXX

I knock on the door of Matthew's office. "Come in," he calls.

"Sam," he says when I enter, rising from his chair.

"What did you call me here for?" I respond bluntly. No point in messing around.

He smiles; he's used to me by now. "You will be sent on a mission soon. If you succeed, you will officially be an agent," he said. He hands me a manila folder. "Here's the details of the op. I'd suggest studying it and spending as much time as you can in the training area."

I open the folder and skim it. I have to kill a politician named Justin Jakes.

"Is that all?" I ask Matthew. He nods, and I turn and left the room.

I can't believe it. I'm almost an agent, and all I have to do is kill one guy. That's not _too_ bad, right?

* * *

**What'd you think? Should I continue? Or is it terrible? Let me know.**


	2. Assignment

**Chapter Two: Assignment**

Hilary finishes my makeup and hair and clips a listening device to my ear, like a Bluetooth, so they will be able to talk to me. She then spreads my hair out so it covers the device.

"Now remember, charm him. Get him to love you," Hilary instructs, going over the plan one more time. "Keep him distracted while Nicholas searches his room. When Nicholas lets you know it's okay, get him alone and kill him." I nod, knowing what I have to do.

She lets me up. Matthew meets me at the door, and I follow him out.

XXX

I lean my head against the car window, feeling its coolness. Matthew has classical music on the radio; not something I ever would have listened to before I came to T.A., but they play it a lot and I had grown to like it. Most of it, anyway. Beethoven and Mozart are my favorites; currently, Tchaikovsky is playing.

"We're here," Matthew informs us, and I feel the car slow to a stop. I open the door and step out of the car, feeling incredibly sexy. I am wearing a skintight blue dress and heels, and my hair is done up but down enough on the sides so that it could cover the device in my ear. I have a gun hidden in my dress, but it will probably be easier to use some other means of killing, whatever seems best at the moment where I kill him. But you never know.

My partner for this mission, Nicholas, comes out after me, and I can tell he was checking me out. I don't care. In this stupid dress, I am sure most guys will be tonight.

Matthew leads me to the door and holds it for me. Nicholas waits; Matthew is going help him sneak into Jakes' room. I step into the party, strolling through until I see the familiar face of Justin Jakes. I'd studied his picture so I could recognize him. He has a tan complexion, close-cropped brown hair, gray eyes, and an angular face. He is thirty-one years old.

He sits at the bar with a couple of other men. I go over and sit next to him, strategically "dropping" a cell phone so he'll notice me when I pick it up. Which, sure enough, he does. He gets to the bait phone before I do and picks it up for me.

"Thanks," I say seductively, smiling.

"I don't believe I've seen you before," he replies, his eyes very obviously roaming my body. "Would you like a drink?" I agree to this, and he gets me a martini; which, I found out, thankfully isn't a very strong one. I have to keep as clear a head as possible, but just one can't hurt, and I won't even have the whole thing.

"And your name would be?" he asks, sipping his own drink.

"Sam," I tell him. I keep my eyelids low and flirty.

"Sam," he repeats, leaning back and putting down his glass. I hear a crackle in my ear device. It's Nicholas.

"Ready," he confirms. "Bring him up."

"Uh, I'm just going to go get something," I say. "Would you like to come with me?"

"Sure," he replies flirtily. I try hard to conceal my disgust; he's eleven years older than me, and drunk. Not to mention _married_. He should be thankful he's not going home to his wife after this little thing here.

I bring him up to a room I know to be empty, that Matthew had gotten me a key for, and shut the door. "It's just over here," I say, going over to the couch, where a suitcase filled with meaningless objects lay. As soon as I knew he'd turned around, I quickly pull the gun out from between my legs and point it at him.

"That was easy," I comment. He turns and sees the gun in my hand. A hint of a smile plays on his lips. He raises his hands above his head in surrender.

"You have beaten me at my own game," he says.

"Don't flatter yourself," I reply, a smirk creeping on the corner of my mouth. "You were never even a player."

And I pull the trigger.

I watch the bullet speed out of the gun, straight for Jakes' head. It hits him dead in the center of his forehead. He collapses backward onto the ground, and then just sort of…lays there. He fell into a really weird position, his arms and legs spayed out and his head lolling to the side.

I speak into my communicator. "Jakes is dead," I say, and that is all. I had been told to wait until Matthew arrived, which I do, and he shows up a few minutes later.

"Go," he says simply. I leave, leaving him to take care of Jakes' body.

XXX

I go immediately to my room, in desperate need of a shower. In the bathroom, I strip off my clothes and step in, loving the feel of the hot water dripping down my skin. I stand there like that for a moment, my eyes closed, just enjoying the feeling.

Afterward, I put on sweatpants and a tanktop (God, it was great to be out of that damn dress) and lay down. I didn't get much sleep last night, and I want to rest my eyes for a few minutes.

A knock had me shooting up out of the bed. I'm not sure if I had fallen asleep or not, if it had been five minutes or three hours. It doesn't matter. I hastily pull my hair up into a ponytail—I was sure it was a mess—and open the door. It's Hilary.

"Go to Walter's office," she informs me. "Matthew and Walter are waiting for you." She escorts me through and allows me access to the office—to get in requires a fingerprint scan—and then walks away, leaving me to Matthew and Walter. I enter hesitantly.

"Sam," Walter says. "Congratulations."

I stay quiet.

"You are now an agent," he continues. "You will get an apartment and be able to go on the outside. Until we need you, of course."

Matthew spoke up then. "It's late, so we'll go tomorrow. We've already acquired you a place."

"Thank you," I say, smiling. For the first time in over a year, I would be able to go outside T.A., and pretend like I was actually a normal person and not an assassin.

Tomorrow's looking good.

* * *

**The next chapter, I think, will be Sam being able to experience life in her apartment for a while, and maybe getting the assignment that brings her to Freddie. Or maybe that'll be the chapter afterward. I'll see how it plays out. And okay, yes, the apartment thing and life-on-the-outside is taken straight from Nikita. That reminds me, I still haven't seen the latest episode. I should.**


	3. Freedom

**Chapter Three: Freedom**

I awoke the next morning feeling excited, without knowing why, before I remembered: Today I would finally be able to get out of T.A., to go somewhere besides a mission, do something on the outside besides murdering someone. I would get an apartment, go shopping, and maybe meet someone. Go somewhere. Do something. I was sick of this room, of this place. I wanted out.

As fast as I could, I took a shower—_Hopefully the last shower in this place for a while_, I thought—and threw on jeans, a T-shirt, and an unzipped hoodie, humming a song I remembered from before this place, though I couldn't recall the name of it.

I headed down to the training area to throw a few punches at some dummies, but as soon as I did, Matthew came and brought me out.

"You're an agent now, remember? You don't train anymore," he told me. Oh yeah. Agents don't train with the recruits. Hey, I'm still slightly fuzzy, okay? We went through the training area, a few people telling me congratulations. My eyes were covered with a blindfold so I wouldn't be able to find my way out again later, but I didn't care.

As soon as we were, Matthew removed the blindfold, and oh God, was it great to see the world again. Even if we were in the middle of nowhere in a desert.

A car I had never seen before waited for us. It was a beautiful dark green Mustang. I had never known much about cars until I came to T.A.—now I could easily fix, hotwire, or pick the lock of a car—but I still don't know or care about how each individual car compares to any other car. But even I could tell it was a great vehicle.

"Get in," Matthew said curtly, sliding into the driver's seat. I didn't argue.

XXX

If seeing an empty desert was great, then the city was amazing. I couldn't even begin to describe how it felt to be seeing buildings, people, cars, stores, and the general hustle and bustle of a city, and actually be a part of that, for the first time in three years. I hadn't been able to live what could even vaguely be considered a normal life since I was seventeen.

After what seemed like forever, we finally got to an apartment building, and Matthew slowed to a stop out front. Getting out of the car, he tossed me the keys. "Wait—this is _mine_?" I asked.

"Well, how else would you expect to get around? Walk?" There was an almost teasing tone to his voice. I rolled my eyes at him, smiling a little, and gave him a small shove. "You know what I mean," I said. He was still smiling.

Matthew punched in a code to open the front door of the apartment building, and told me what it was just loud enough so that I could hear. He led me up to apartment 3C and turned a key in the lock, which he then handed to me. "Put that on the keyring," he instructed. I did.

"Welcome," Matthew said, stepping in the door, "to your new apartment." A smile lit up my face and I immediately plopped myself down on the couch, hooking my leg over the top.

"Oh, yeah, I could get used to this," I sighed, closing my eyes for a couple of seconds.

"Make sure you don't get too used to it, though," Matthew responded, both serious and teasing at the same time. "Have fun."

I got off the couch and starting looking through drawers. I didn't actually expect anything to be in them, but whatever. I found a remote and switched on the large TV near me. A few minutes of guide-searching and channel surfing brought me to an old rerun of _Friends_. I used to watch this show all the time—Carly and I had even compared the characters to us. I was Phoebe, she was Monica, Spencer was Joey, Gibby was Chandler, Freddie was Ross because there wasn't anyone else, and we hadn't found anyone for Rachel, so Carly had decided that she acts sort of like me sometimes, so I was both Phoebe and Rachel. Oh, I missed her so much. Out of all the things I missed from my old life, I probably missed Carly the most.

I smiled just when I saw what episode it was. Chandler and Joey had left Ross's baby son Ben on the city bus and were going to pick him up at the City Hall or wherever. There were two babies, one wearing ducks and one clowns, and they couldn't figure out which one was Ben, so they decided to flip a coin.

"_Well, ducks are heads, because ducks have heads,_" Joey said.

Chandler stared at him a moment. "_What kind of scary-ass clowns came to your birthday party?_"

I laughed; really laughed. It felt good to laugh, even if it was just at some TV show. I hadn't since…since before I was taken by T.A. I felt a pang as I realized that. What else like that had I missed from my old life?

I got up off the couch and looked around more. And then I saw it, on the table: a laptop. I grabbed it and sat back on the couch again, digging my finger into the power button, yelling at it to go faster.

After what seemed like an eternity, I was greeted by the Welcome screen. I would set it all up later; right now, only one thing mattered. I impatiently got onto the Internet and typed _iCarly . com_ into the search bar. I hesitated for just a second before pressing enter. I _had_ to know if, against all odds, she was alive.

The website still looked the same as it had before. I was even still in the picture at the top.

"Cool Webcast Highlights," I muttered to myself as I clicked on it. The sign spun and a list of videos popped up. Since the last webcast I had done, there had only been one show. It was titled "iCarly: Breaking News." Slowly, I moved my mouse to the thumbnail and clicked on the video, bracing myself.

Carly's face showed up on screen, exactly as I remembered her: wavy brown hair, innocent brown eyes, a beautiful face, and everything. But this time, she wasn't smiling like she usually was. I also noted that she wasn't in the iCarly studio—she was sitting on a couch in someone else's house, Spencer next to her. With a jolt, I realized that there was a red, angry-looking scar all the way down the left side of her face. Her eyes were red, and it was obvious she had been crying.

"This isn't a normal webshow of iCarly," she began, and it broke my heart a little to hear her voice. "In fact, I have some terrible news for you all. iCarly is over. We won't be doing it anymore." She paused a second and sniffled before continuing.

"There was a fire in our building," she said. "And Sam—Sam didn't m-make it out." She stuttered on the last sentence, her voice wavering and lip quivering. She began to cry again, and Spencer put an arm around her shoulders, bringing her head to his shoulder. "It would be t-too painful to do iCarly anymore," Carly continued after a minute. "Not without Sam. And Freddie—he's still in the hospital. He's unconscious."

My heart lifted a little just knowing that Carly and Spencer were alive. But what about Freddie? Carly had said he was still in the hospital then: did this mean he just had worse injuries than Carly and Spencer and had gotten out, or had they been so bad he'd died? There were no other posts—in video or text form. I had no way of knowing.

**And now you know what happened to Sam, and Carly, Spencer, and Freddie. What did you think?**

**On another note, what did everyone think of iPity the Nevel? I liked it, I thought it was a lot funnier than iHire an Idiot—not that that one wasn't funny too. I loved that Spencer had nothing to do during the episode, and that was his storyline.**

**Oh, by the way, in case anyone's wondering, the episode of _Friends _I used is "The One With The Baby On the Bus."**


	4. Surprise

**Chapter Four: Surprise**

I had been living in my apartment for a few weeks now, and I was quite enjoying it. I could never get tired of the feeling of freedom, even temporary freedom. I knew it wouldn't last. So I relished every second of it.

I was out in town, shopping. I hadn't actually been shopping yet; food shopping, yes. Any other kind, no. I had finally managed to find the mall—and trust me, that had been a lot harder than it should have been—and I was now exploring it. I'd already bought a ton of clothes, electronics, and a lot of other stuff I really didn't need. But who cared?

My cell phone rang, making me jump. "Hello?" I asked, cupping the phone between my cheek and my shoulder.

"Sam? It's Matthew."

"Hey."

"Where are you right now?"  
"I'm at the mall," I said, searching through a rack of clothes. "Why?"

"We need you back at T.A.," he said. "You've got another assignment. Be at your apartment in one hour."

"Fine." There was a _click_ on the other end of the line as he hung up. I pouted to myself for a second. Why would they ruin my fun? I was _loving_ being on the outside. I'd become pretty good friends with my neighbor, Amy, and she'd notice if I suddenly disappeared. Well, I had an hour; I could think of something. I'd say I was going on a sudden business trip. Yeah, that'd work.

I quickly left the mall and found my car. (The Mustang was amazing, I gotta say.) It took me about fifteen minutes to get back to the apartment.

I deposited my numerous bags in my room and went across the hall, knocking on Amy's door. She opened it a second later. Thank God she was home.

"Hey Sam!" she said brightly, her face lighting up. That's what I liked about Amy—she was always so cheerful and positive. It reminded me of Carly, a little. Maybe that was why I had become friends with her.

"Amy!" I replied, trying and failing to match her enthusiasm. Hey, I'm not a very emotional person. She turned and walked back into her apartment, inviting me to come in. I followed her.

"So my boss called," I began—I had told her that I worked at Transfer of Archives, T.A.'s cover, like I was supposed to—"and he needs me immediately to bring some archives to, um, Tennessee." It was the first place I thought of. "University of Memphis, I think. He needs me at the office in an hour." Well, he'd be there in half an hour, really, but in half an hour I could leave and pretend I was just setting off in my car to leave.

Amy looked kind of confused. "Oh. Okay. Kind of sudden, isn't it?"

"Yeah, he called fifteen minutes ago."

"Alright…so if I won't be seeing you for—how long?" she said, turning it into a question at the end.

"I don't know."

"For—I don't know how long, then why don't you stay here until you have to leave?"

I smiled a little. "Sure."

XXX

My phone rang again. Again, it was Matthew. "Get outside," he said, and nothing more.

"Alright, I gotta go," I said, getting up off the couch. Amy stood up, too, and gave me a hug. I stood there a moment, shocked, before awkwardly putting my arms around her. "Bye Amy. See you…whenever."

"Bye!" She waved cheerily.

I got out to Matthew's car and hopped in. It took us about forty-five minutes to get to T.A., not including the ten minutes at the end where I was blindfolded. Inside the walls, the blindfold was removed. "Walter's office," Matthew directed me, going another way and leaving me. Fortunately, I knew where it was.

Hilary was waiting for me and pressed her finger to the scanner. Then she silently stepped aside and let me pass, into the boss' office.

I looked around in awe. I had never been in here before. But this must be where the agents go to receive their assignments, right? This was my first assignment as an agent, so really I didn't know much.

"Hello, Samantha," he said. I gritted my teeth. If he were anyone else, I would have gotten mad and injured them for calling me that. But Walter could kill me with his pinky nail, without batting an eye, and be halfway to dinner by the time someone found my body. So I kept my mouth shut.

"Hello, Walter," I responded calmly as I could manage. "How are you?"

"I'm fine, thanks." Our exchange was completely neutral, generic. You could find this conversation between anyone in the world. We gave short, clipped answers. We were polite in that cold way, the one that says we're only being polite because we have to.

"This is a very important mission," he began. Alright, now we were getting somewhere. "You will be on your own on this one." I was surprised. My first mission as an agent, and I was on my own? "It's not just a hit-and-run job. You will have to work at it, build the target's trust, and then find some way to kill him." That explained a lot.

"The target's name," he continued, "is Vincent Karl Hastings. He is twenty years old. He's a student at Cornwall University. Lately, for a research paper, Hastings has been finding out a little too much about us." Even though I didn't know my way out of T.A., I knew where we were located, and Cornwall was right near the city I'd been living in. I wondered how this Hastings guy could have even began anything on finding out about us.

Walter then handed me a manila folder. God, these people loved manila folders. I opened it and saw a few sheets of printed pages, stapled together: information about Vincent Hastings. I noticed he was at Cornwall as a technology and computer major.

"You should take your car, the Mustang," Walter told me. I snapped my head up from the papers. "It will be less conspicuous than if Matthew drove you."

"How should I meet him?"

"That," he said, leaning back in his chair, "is up to you. Run into him someplace. Knock on his door when you're moving into the apartment we got you next door to his. I don't care."

I nodded. "Is there anything else?" He shook his head.

"Thank you," I said. A nod from Walter. And just like that, we were back to the forced politeness.

XXX

I was allowed to go back to my apartment after that, but I decided to stay. I mean, I was leaving tomorrow, and besides, I'd already told Amy I was going to be gone. She'd be suspicious if I suddenly showed up later the same day and then left again the next.

So, on that note, I headed back to the room I still had here. Everybody at T.A. had a room—recruit, agent, or otherwise—that stayed theirs until they were dead. Which, sometimes, happened pretty quickly around here.

I pawed through the books Hilary had given me. There's not much to do around here in your free time, so she'd given me a ton of books. Besides, I'd liked reading ever since that bet with Freddie about _The Penny Treasure_. I just hadn't done it much. I picked _The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo_ by Stieg Larsson, sat down on my bed, and started reading. The prologue got me hooked instantly. I decided I was going to bring this with me on the mission—after all, it _was_ a long-term one.

A couple of hours later, when I got to chapter 8, I shut off the light and crawled into bed. _I leave tomorrow_, I thought, happy and sad at the same time. Happy I was getting out of here, but sad I would have to kill somebody.

XXX

_Beep! Beep! Beep!_ The alarm clock next to my bed went off. I groaned, rolled over, and brought my palm down hard on the snooze button. Five minutes later I dragged myself out of bed and, zombielike, made my way to the shower.

I came out feeling refreshed and about halfway awake. I needed two things to start my day: a shower and coffee. Otherwise I'm useless. The coffee I could get in the cafeteria—the agents' cafeteria, that is; there were separate ones for agents and recruits. Subconsciously I realized that it was my first time eating in the agents' cafe.

Once I sat down, Ian came and sat next to me. Ian was probably the person I was closest to here at T.A. Everyone's gotta have somebody to talk to, right? Besides Carly and Freddie, Ian and Amy were some of the best friends I'd ever had. If I hadn't met Ian here, I would've gone crazy.

Ian was extremely cute. He was tall, with olive skin, black shoulder-length hair and dark brown eyes the color of milk chocolate. I had confessed to him that I used to be on iCarly—I preferred to keep that secret now; I hated talking about my previous life—and he'd told me that he used to watch it all the time. He was nice enough, but if you got on his bad side you were dead. He was one of the best fighters I've ever met. No match for me, though.

"Hey, stranger," he said. "Long time no see."

"Hey," I said, with a small smile.

"So," he prompted, "I hear you've been assigned a long-term mission." I nodded in conformation. "Who's the target?"

I raised an eyebrow and gave him a half-smile. "Oh, well you know I can't tell you the name."

"I _know_, but tell me about him. Or her."

"He's a college student, I guess. A tech geek, obviously, since he's majoring in technology and computers." I rolled my eyes. "And I gotta spend a bunch of time with him. Yippee."

"So was Freddie," Ian said, raising an eyebrow. "You got along with _him_. Well, sort of," he added after a thought.

I didn't say anything. A moment later Ian, sensing my discomfort, changed the subject. I gladly played along.

XXX

I glanced again at the GPS on my dashboard. "_Turn right in 1.6 miles_," it told me. I gritted my teeth. "Shut _upppp_," I complained, glaring daggers at the small device, wishing I could bash it with a sledgehammer. I really, really hate GPS's.

I arrived in the small college town of Lebec, where the Cornwall U campus was. I parked outside the front of the school and went into the administration office. The people at T.A. had drawn up papers for me to be a student.

An hour later, I had finally filled out all of the paperwork. I was using a cover name, too—as far as Cornwall was concerned, I was Amanda Rose Thompson, or Mandy. I wasn't sure who had come up with the name.

I flipped open the phone that Blomkvist, T.A.'s resident computer hacker, had given me. **Done**_,_ I sent to Blomkvist. A minute later he texted back **He's in the campus library**_._ How he figured that stuff out, I'll never know. I didn't particularly want to, either.

I consulted the map of campus the secretary, Julia Rosenbloom, had given me. The campus library was only a short walk away from where I was.

Almost immediately once I entered the huge stone building, my phone beeped. **History section**, Blomkvist had written. **Civil War**. _Figures_, I thought. Like I'd ever be caught dead in the history section of a library. Or any part of a library, for that matter. I suppose Civil War wasn't too bad, though. It could've been a section on math.

I managed to find my way to the history section, then looked around until I saw the sign hanging from the stacks reading CIVIL WAR. **He's standing still. Looking at a book called **_**North and South**_, Blomkvist sent me. Like I needed that—he was the only one there. I went over and, accidentally-on-purpose, bumped into him.

"Oh, I'm so sorry," I fake-apologized.

"It's okay," the guy said. I froze. I knew that voice. Why did I know that voice?

Slowly, I looked up into my target's eyes. He met mine at the same time.

"_Freddie_?"

**So there you go, she's met Freddie! Finally. I have the first few paragraphs of chapter 5 written already—this is actually the second version of the chapter I wrote. I uploaded the first one, and then a couple of hours later I deleted it. I like this one better. I started chapter 5 before I decided to rewrite this one.**

** Name explanations—Sam's first. Amanda/Mandy: Because I was looking at a stack of books that I'm going to read and **_**A Walk to Remember**_** was on top, and Mandy Moore's in the movie. Rose: In that same pile of books were the **_**Tudor Rose**_** trilogy by Susan Wiggs. Thompson: It's my friend's last name, I was on Facebook, and it just fit. Freddie's—Vincent: I think I had been watching What I Like About You (another of the great Dan Schneider's shows) earlier that day, and one of the characters is Vince. Karl: The Freddie character's middle name. Hastings: I think Pretty Little Liars was on the night that I wrote that, and the character Spencer's last name is Hastings.**

** Oh! I have an awesome book that everybody should read: the "Chaos Walking" trilogy by Patrick Ness**_**.**_** I read it for book club and it was **_**amazing**_**. And **_**Water for Elephants**_** by Sara Gruen—the movie's not as good as the book. **_**North and South**_**, by the way, is a real book, by John Jakes.**

** As far as I know, I made up Cornwall University, and I know I made up Lebec. By the way, it's pronounced like **_**lee-beck**_** in my head.**

** What did everyone think of iOMG? Needless to say, I loved it. Our TV cable box thingy was broken, so I found a live stream of Nickelodeon online—it was me, my friend, my mom, and my brother all sitting around the computer. ;)**

** Congratulations if you've actually read all the way through this thing. I've probably wasted your time. I'll go now and stop rambling.**


	5. Reminiscing

**Chapter Five: Reminiscing**

"_Freddie?_" I gasped in surprise, seeing the man in front of me.

Dazed-looking, he placed the book down. He slowly extended his arm and touched my cheek. "Sam," he said in a choked voice, as if he needed to touch me, make sure I was real and tangible, before he could believe it was me. "Sam," he repeated.

And then, before I knew what was happening, he was kissing me.

Oh my God, it was _amazing_. When we kissed before, our first kiss, it was nothing like this. Then, we'd been awkward and unsure what to do. It had been short then, and extremely uncomfortable because we were, after all, frenemies. This time, I could feel it with every fiber of my being, the passion, fire and lust—

And then, just like that, it was gone. His lips had parted with mine. I didn't realize at first, and kept my eyes closed. Then they snapped open and widened. "What the _hell_ was that?" I exclaimed, whacking him in the arm a little harder than I meant to. He winced.

"I thought you were dead," he whispered hoarsely, embracing me, holding me close. "You have no idea what I went through when I thought you were gone. What we all went through."

"I thought you were dead too," I admitted, talking into his incredibly muscular chest. "I just found out a couple of weeks ago that Carly and Spencer are alive. But I had no idea about you."

"Why didn't you come back, Sam?" Freddie asked, letting me go but keeping his hands on my shoulders, his elbows bent, searching my face for an answer. "What happened to you?" He removed one hand.

Oh God. I couldn't tell him I had been taken by a secret organization that trained assassins. Or that I'd been told to kill him! That certainly wouldn't go too well. _Make something up_, my brain told me.

"Well, uh, afterwards, like I said, I thought you were all dead. So I ran," I lied. "I ran away and changed my name. I'm Amanda Rose Thompson now."

He let out a bark of laughter. "I changed my name too. I'm Vincent Karl Hastings."

A grin escaped my lips as I pretended like this was new information to me. "Yeah? Where'd you get that?"

"I have no idea," he confessed. "So what about Amanda? Where'd she come from?"

"I don't know either." We shared a small laugh about this.

"Why _did_ you change your name?" I asked quietly after a moment's silence.

"I tried to live normally after the fire, but I just…I couldn't do it. After a couple of months I bought a bus ticket and just…left. I changed my name so I could get a clean slate, start over. People at first recognized me from iCarly, but I denied that it was me. After a while it stopped happening so often. Now I'm here."

"Same here," I said. "I just…wanted to get away from everything, build a new life for myself, you know? A couple of weeks ago I felt all sentimental and decided to check out iCarly .com. I found the video of Carly saying what had happened."

"So I guess fate brought us here together," he said, bringing me close again and releasing me a moment later.

"I guess so," I agreed, my heart sinking and soaring at the same time.

XXX

I couldn't believe it. How could I kill _Freddie_? I mean, I know I always tortured the guy, but still, I could never kill him. It was one thing killing people I didn't know; that was bad enough. But to kill someone I'd grown up with, one of my best friends? Impossible.

I had liked that kiss earlier much more than I cared to admit. It was billion times better than our other kiss. Was it possible—no. There was no way. If T.A. ever found out, they'd just send someone else in to kill him, and then they'd get what they wanted. Then they'd kill me for getting distracted and falling for someone, especially someone who was a target.

I couldn't let that happen to Freddie. I just couldn't.

I decided I would do everything I could to keep him away from it, and make absolutely sure they never found out about him.

XXX

My phone beeped once again, but this time not from Blomkvist—it was from Freddie. **Meet me in my dorm**, it read. **Eagle Hall, room 3L. My roommate's not here and I want to talk to you.** Oh Freddie, always having to have perfect spelling. It's a _text_, for crying out loud. I responded with **Be there in 5 min** and snapped the phone shut.

A few minutes of fumbling with the map later, I had the route to Eagle Hall from my dorm, Lily Hall (the guys' were birds and animals, the girls' were flowers—so sexist and cliché), mapped out. I stepped in the elevator and jabbed the _3_ button with my finger, then searched for room L.

Arriving, I raised my fist and knocked. The door opened a moment later to reveal Freddie—or should I say Vince? He told me he preferred Vince, like he preferred Freddie to Fredward.

"Hey," he said, a smile lighting up his face.

"Hey," I said calmly back, striding past him into the room. I plopped myself down on one of the beds, not really caring whether it was Freddie's or his roommate's. He didn't say anything, just sat down across from me on the other bed.

"So, uh, how do you like campus?" he asked.

I snorted. "Seriously? That's what you're gonna ask me? We haven't seen each other in three years and you ask me how I like a freaking college campus? That's so like you, Fredbag."

He smiled. "I've missed you calling me names." I didn't know what to say. What _could_ I say to that? I must've looked like a fish out of water, sitting there staring at him like an idiot. Finally I stuttered, "Thanks?"

He let out a small chuckle and looked down and to the side, flashing me back to a similar movement that night we had our first kiss, just before he suggested it. "Seriously. I never realized how boring my life would've been if it wasn't for you." I couldn't believe it. I'd hardly received any compliments in my life at all—never mind from _Freddie_. "Or how much of a wimpy dork I was and still would be."

"Well, I can agree to that," I said happily. "I'll admit, you got tougher to beat up and insult towards the end there."

His eyebrows shot up. "Did the great Sam Puckett actually just say I'm _not_ completely wimpy?"

I giggled and punched him lightly in the arm. "Don't get used to it. And hey, that doesn't mean you're not totally weak," I teased. "Just less than before."

An awkward silence followed, and we both knew what the other was thinking of but we were both avoiding talking about: the kiss. Finally Freddie broke the quiet by saying, "So…how've you been the past three years?"

"Could've been better, could've been worse," I replied after a moment. As in—_I could or couldn't have been taken by assassins and forced to kill_. Or, _it would've been better if I could have stayed in Seattle for the past three years_. There were many ways my life could've been better, but it was too long of a list to think of. "You?" I looked at him out of the corner of my eye, my head hanging forward slightly.

"Uh, fine, I guess," he stumbled. "I told you earlier what happened."

After yet another few minutes of total silence, the ticking of the clock driving me insane, I finally burst out with, "Why'd you kiss me yesterday?"

The corner of his mouth turned up. "Honestly," he began, me hanging on every word, "I've been wanting to ever since our first kiss. Then I thought you died, and the thought that I'd never be able to—it just crushed me, enough to run away and change my name, apparently. And then, there you were. I didn't even think about it, I just did it." He hadn't been meeting my eyes the entire time, but he did now. "Sam, after our kiss I started to get a crush on you. I guess it never really faded."

I bit my lip. "I…kinda had a bit of a crush on you too," I admitted. "I just didn't want anyone to know, so I made sure to keep harassing you." Throughout this, we had both slowly been leaning forward and neither of us realized it. Now we were just inches away from each other's faces—Freddie slowly leaned over and closed the gap; as he did so, he came over to sit next to me instead of across from me.

He pulled back, and I kept my eyes closed and my lips slightly apart, not wanting it to end. I didn't smack him this time, or say I hated him and that we'd never speak of the kiss again. I just sat there, looking at him, not saying a word. It felt like it would ruin the moment, as if all of time was suspended just for us, and if we spoke, the spell would be broken.

Eventually Freddie cleared his throat. "So, um, yeah," he stuttered. "What's going on now?"

"I guess…we're dating?" I said, coming out more of a question than an answer.

"I guess so," he replied.

* * *

**Woo, school's out! Yesterday was my last day, and my entire grade went to an amusement park. Theoretically I'll have more time to write now. I actually had this done on, I think Monday, but I sent it to DeadlyRedAlice for beta-ing.**

**Anyway, what did you think of the chapter? I think it's eh. Except for parts of the beginning I liked. So Sam and Freddie are dating now, apparently. I didn't plan that, it just sort of happened. They've taken on a mind of their own. Lol**


	6. Rendezvous

**Chapter Six: Rendezvous**

"Hey, baby," Freddie greeted me jokingly in a low, deep voice. It earned him a look from me that was half glare, half smile.

"Ready?" I asked him.

"Yep, one second," he murmured, leaning over the table and clicking a few things on his laptop to set it to sleep mode. "Okay, let's go."

It was Freddie's and my first official date. We had _technically_ started going out two weeks ago, but had yet to go on a real date. We were going out to dinner first, then a movie. I didn't know what we were seeing, but I told Freddie it better be an action movie. I didn't want to watch any of that sappy romance stuff. Last time I saw a romance movie was _The First Kiss_ with Carly, and I'd hated every second of it. Stupidest movie ever.

As Freddie put his arm around me as we left the building, a small voice in my head told me that this was probably closer than Walter, Hilary, and Matthew had meant. But I didn't care; it was Freddie. He was worth it.

Suddenly a thought occurred to me: Wouldn't they have _known_ "Vincent" was Freddie? Blomkvist could get information and background on anyone; hell, he could dig up their biggest, deepest, most buried secrets in less than a minute if he wanted to. Meaning he _had_ to have known who Freddie was, and I knew he obviously knew who I was.

So he must've known, too, the connection between me and Freddie, that we knew each other and did iCarly together three years before. With personal ties to the target, why, then, had I been put on this assignment? Was it a test? A test to see where my loyalties lied?

The new possibility scared me. Was Freddie even really finding out anything about T.A., or had Walter just made that up? Or even worse, was Freddie working with them?

It was just like Walter and Hilary to do this. Test my mind, trick me into second-guessing myself into oblivion, agonizing over everything, wondering if it was all just a trap that I had gotten sucked into like a fool.

"Sam, you alright?" Freddie asked, looking concerned.

I flicked my gaze over to him. "Yeah, I'm alright."

"Well come on then, _se__ñ__orita_," Freddie said, his Random Spanish making an appearance. I obliged.

XXX

"Your table, sir," a maître d'—in a fancy-looking tux—said to Freddie, bowing out. "Your server will be with you in just a moment." We sat, Freddie pulling out my chair like some gentleman.

Freddie had chosen an incredibly fancy Italian restaurant, called Catavolo's. "Wow," I said. "Schmancy." I unfolded my menu and looked over it.

"What are you getting?" Freddie asked, his eyes not leaving his own menu.

"Chicken alfredo," I answered. Couldn't go wrong with that—or at least I hoped so. "You?"

"Chicken Parmesan."

"Lots of chicken tonight," I commented. There was an awkward pause. "Okay, can you believe we're having trouble talking? I mean, it's not like we haven't known each other since fifth grade."

"You're right. This isn't a normal date," he agreed. A waiter came by to take our order, and a few minutes later plates of salad and drinks were placed in front of us. I poured raspberry vinaigrette dressing all over mine. "Hey, Sam, can I tell you about something?"

"Sure. What?"

He looked around, as if to make sure no one was listening (because people totally care what two random people are talking about), leaned forward and said in a hushed tone, "You know that old building a couple of miles out of town, the archive storage warehouse?"

"Yeah," I said, sticking a piece of lettuce in my mouth and trying not to show how nervous I was. He was talking about T.A.

"I've been doing some research, finding out some things, and I don't think it's really what they say it is."

I scoffed. "Oh, please. What else could it be?"

A pause, and then: "I think it's a place where the government secretly trains assassins."

I froze. He had just got it dead on the nose, hit the bull's-eye, whatever. Somehow, Freddie truly had found out about T.A. I managed to regain my composure and said, "That's crazy. Why would they train assassins here, out by Nowhereville, Arizona?" Nowhereville was actually a great nickname for the town, really called Riverdale, which was ironic because there were no rivers within a ten-mile radius. It was so tiny and unimportant it didn't show up on most maps, with a population of only 1,500.

"Because no one would think to look here." His answer was so simple, so matter-of-fact, that it scared me. I was scared that he knew way too much than he should and that they would get sick of waiting for me to kill him and send someone else, someone like that freaky girl Lisbeth who would kill anybody without a second thought.

"They kidnap people," he continued. "People who are in jail, people with criminal records, people who are basically dead to the world, and they train them. They train these people to fight and to kill." The way he said it, like the very thought disgusted him, made my heart sink a little.

At that moment the waiter returned with our food. "Oh look, the food's here!" I cried, welcoming the interruption. I grabbed my plate from the waiter and shoveled a forkful of pasta into my mouth, closing the subject for now. The best part was that Freddie didn't think anything of it—it was perfectly normal for me. In fact, he even chuckled.

I raised my eyebrow. "What, you think that's funny, Fredward?"

He shrugged. "Kinda." After a pause, he added, "Actually, it's kind of cute."

I tried to hide a grin and slight blush—wait, Sam Puckett does _not_ blush. "You think I'm cute?" Like I needed to verify it or something. Oh God, I was acting like some weird boy-obsessed, hormone-crazed, on-a-date-with-my-crush-of-five-years sort of girl, which I did _not_ want to be and am not in any way. That was always Carly's job, and then Amy's once I met her.

"Adorable." He smiled, both with his mouth and his eyes, then leaned over the table and gave me a quick kiss on the lips. "And hot. Extremely hot."

"Hot?" I burst out in surprise. "Wow, Fredley, I don't think _anyone's_ ever called me that before. Especially not you."

"Well, I can't imagine why, because it's true." By now my cheeks were probably bright red, and I didn't care anymore.

XXX

Freddie dropped me off in front of Lily Hall. "See you tomorrow?" he said, and I nodded. He grabbed me by the waist and pulled me in, capturing my lips with his. I got lost in the kiss, my mind clearing of all thought. Each kiss with Freddie was better than the last.

"Goodnight," he said as we broke apart, then walking away, back to Eagle. I was grinning from ear to ear on my way back to my room. I slipped in as quietly as possible, not wanting to wake up the roommate I'd been assigned.

"Seems like you had a good night, Mandy," my roommate, Patricia Burke, commented. I jumped, for I had thought she was asleep when I came in. I flipped on the lights.

"I did," I answered. I had met Patricia the day before, when I moved in. She was twenty-one, from Minneapolis, and had refined features, hazel eyes, and long, dark brunette-black hair that was accented by a dyed blue streak. She was majoring in pre-law. And don't ask why I know this, because we're required to know.

"With that guy Vince? He's so cute," she said. "Congratulations. You've achieved what no other girl at Cornwall has been able to do."

"What?"

"You got Vince to go out with you. Hell, you got Vince to _talk_ to you. He's kind of a loner."

"Fr—Vince is a loner?" I asked, catching myself before I said Freddie's real name. "He didn't seem like one."

"Oh yeah," Patricia replied. "Big-time. Doesn't really talk to anyone except a few guys in his dorm."

Huh. Freddie was a loner. I never would've pegged him as the type to be or become one, but whatever.

Patricia switched off the lights. "Alright, I got a test tomorrow in Torts, so I gotta get to bed. Night."

"Night," I responded habitually. It occurred to me that in the morning I should probably call Matthew for an update.

* * *

**Heh, I finished this like 5 days ago, but I've been too busy to publish it. :} Don't ask me where I got "Rendezvous" from, I just needed a fancy word for date, because "date" felt too boring to me as a chapter title.**

**I've been reading the Kay Scarpetta series by Patricia Cornwell lately, and in the 4th book (Cruel and Unusual), there was something that totally made me think of Sam. Kay's partner, Pete Marino, told her, "You've always been a real busy lady, slow to let anyone in. But once he's in, he's in. He's got a damn friend for life and you'd do anything for him." Or something like that. I think I got the first sentence wrong. Anyway, they're really good books if you like murder mysteries.**

**Another good author: Emily Giffin. I've read all of her books except one, which I've only read a few pages of so far. She wrote "Something Borrowed," you know, that movie that just came out?**

**I do realize how random this is, yes. I'll shut up now and go.**


	7. Betrayals

**Chapter Seven: Betrayals**

As it turns out, I didn't have to call Matthew: He called me.

"Sam," came Matthew's deep, strong voice by way of greeting. "How's the mission going?"

"Oh, fine," I said automatically. "He's starting to trust me, view me as a friend." As I said the words, I realized it was true: we always had been, all these years, even if we never would have admitted it.

"Good. And he hasn't mentioned anything suspicious to you? Anything that might make you think he knows more than he should?"

I didn't answer for a moment, considering. Should I tell Matthew the truth, or should I protect Freddie? If I told Matthew, and I didn't kill Freddie right away, I knew T.A. would just send someone else to do it; if I lied and they found out, they'd probably kill both of us. On the other hand, lying might buy me some time. I made a split-second decision and, before I could change my mind, said, "No. Nothing at all."

"All right. Thank you, Sam." There was a _click_ as Matthew hung up.

I sank down onto my bed, feeling guilty as hell. I had a duty to T.A.—they _had_ saved me, after all, and trained me to be a better fighter than I ever could have become on my own. On the other hand, they forced me to kill, something I hated doing. Was it all worth it?

XXX

I sat curled up in a chair in my dorm room, reading _The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo_, the book I'd brought from T.A. A knock on the door to my room jerked me out of Mikael and Lisbeth's adventure in Hedestad and I looked up, irritated. I figured it was probably my idiot of a roommate, Patricia—for a girl who was studying to be a lawyer, she could be pretty dumb sometimes, and in only the short time I'd been there, she was constantly forgetting her key. I got up and opened the door.

Instead of seeing Patricia, I got a shock when I recognized the person standing in front of me. It was Lucy, a girl from T.A. who I didn't know personally, but I knew of her. She had a reputation at T.A., one everybody knew about. She was cold and ruthless—my sort-of friend Ian had even gone so far as to call her a heartless bitch, and he wasn't wrong. They could have replaced Lucy with a robot and nobody would notice. Just looking at the girl sent chills up your spine—she had an angled face and high cheekbones, and shoulder-length hair black as night. The most chilling thing about her, though, were her eyes. They were empty, hollow pools of a light blue that seemed to pierce through you and see straight into your soul.

"Lucy," I stammered. "What—what are you doing here?"

"Matthew felt you were hidin' something," she drawled in a thick Southern accent. "So he sent me to check if y'all were up to the job, an' if not, I should just go ahead and do it myself."

My jaw dropped open. "What?" _Nononononono!_ I needed more time to figure out what I was going to do—they couldn't do this! "You can't do this!" I blurted. _Oh, God!_ I mentally slapped myself. Unthinkingly, I had voiced my thoughts out loud, which never ended well for me.

Lucy shrugged indifferently. "And why not?"

"Because…" I started, searching for an excuse, anything that might postpone the inevitable, "because this is my mission!" I finished lamely. That one earned me a mental punch in the face. "T.A. trusted me with it. I intend to do it myself. I don't need your help." Cool, composed, calm. That was at least a _little_ better. Barely.

She eyed me warily. "Fine," she said finally, but I could hear the skeptism in her voice. "I'll be staying nearby though. One more chance or he's mine."

"Fair enough," I agreed, my heart sinking all the way down to the floor.

XXX

I avoided Freddie the next few days, not having the heart to see his face, look right in his eyes, knowing I absolutely had to kill him soon. The difference between now and before was that after Lucy's little visit, I had a time limit—one I didn't even know the length of.

I dodged his calls and ignored his texts as long as I could. Eventually, on the fifth day, he sought me out on campus and managed to find me in the most obvious place: the on-campus Chinese restaurant, Good Fortune.

I spotted him from across the room from where I sat gnawing on a boneless spare rib. _I should've hid in the gym,_ I thought. By that point, he had already seen me and was almost to my table, so it was too late for an escape.

"Hey," he said with a small smile, pulling out the chair across from me and sitting, his arms resting on the table.

"Hey," I said back curtly, shoveling a spoonful of rice into my mouth, trying to make it clear I didn't want to talk. Unfortunately, Freddie was used to this tactic and it didn't deter him at all.

"Have you been avoiding me?"

"No." I lied yet another time this week. It was a week of lies. "I've just been…busy, that's all."

He scoffed. "Doing what?"

"Nothing you need to know about, Benson!" I snapped; it came out a bit more aggravated than I'd intended. I was freaking out, my nerves were on edge, and I was jumpy and paranoid. It wasn't his fault.

"Wouldn't want to know anyway, Puckett," he shot back, smirking. I glared of him through eyes that became narrow slits. He was _mocking_ me.

"Don't you make fun of Momma," I threatened jokingly, pointing my fork at him and raising an eyebrow. A smile turned up at the corners of his mouth.

"I've missed this," he said simply—somehow effective no matter how cliché.

"Me too," I admitted, truthfully, and he took my hand in his and stroked my palm gently with his thumb.

I had the sudden feeling I was being watched—_There's that paranoia again, Sam_—and, looking around the room, caught a glimpse of a man in a black suit standing in the corner. When I turned my head to get a better look at him, he was gone. Still, I couldn't shake the nagging feeling that I knew him somehow.

XXX

The next day I was late to a class, as usual. Hilary had decided to make my persona Amanda an art major, because I drew and painted often during my spare time at T.A. Supposedly, Cornwall had a great art program. Surprisingly, I was loving it. If it weren't for that damned night three years ago, maybe I would have done it for real. I wonder if I would have thought of it. Maybe I could've been like Spencer.

Professor Farley shot me a glare, but I didn't care. She was a nasty old bitch and I hated her. I liked the class itself, but avoided her as much as possible. I took a seat and pulled out a notebook and pencil, pretending to take notes, but actually I was too distracted for that; instead, I doodled. Hey, it was an art class. They _want_ you to draw.

My thoughts wandered while my hand worked absentmindedly, seemingly independent of my body, like it wasn't actually me drawing. I worried about Freddie's condemned fate, my future (if I had one), and T.A.

Again, I had the feeling I was being watched. I turned to the window right beside me and heart a rattling of bushes. This time, though, I didn't see anybody and wrote it off for now, though I was still kind of concerned.

I glanced down at the open page of my notebook and realized that I had drawn several detailed pictures of me and Freddie: kissing, getting married, with a baby; and all surrounded by little hearts in between drawings. Then I noticed one at the top of the page, smaller than the rest—me firing a gun at people who looked suspiciously like Matthew, Walter, and Hilary, all of whom were lying on the ground, bleeding. I quickly slammed the notebook shut and tried to forget it ever happened, listening attentively to Farley to try and empty my mind of all thought.

XXX

The next day I was in the library yet again—the teacher had forced us all to go. I had been in a library more times on this mission than all the rest of my life combined.

I was halfheartedly leafing through an art book, looking at the pictures and trying to make it seem as if I were actually reading it, when I heard footsteps behind me. Thinking nothing of it, I continued until I felt something cold, like metal, on the back of my neck. Several people around me gasped. I calmly turned around to see Matthew, holding a gun to me.

"Hello, Sam," he spat with a fake smile, about as fake as a smile can get.

"Hello, Matthew," I said back in a too-sugary-sweet voice, paired with a fake smile of my own. "What brings you here this fine day?"

Okay, that might've been a little much.

I pulled a very small .38 out of my pocket—tiny and concealable, but still powerful, like Will Smith's blaster in _Men in Black_. I was never without it—and pointed it at my former mentor.

"You knew who Freddie really was all along," I accused. It wasn't even a question. "Why'd you pick me for this mission?"

Matthew's lips curled into a sneer. "It was a test," he snarled. "Every agent must go through one. It was a test of your loyalty, and you _failed_."

"Yeah, well I fail most tests," I fired back. "Always have, always will."

"That's too bad. You had some real potential, Sam."

"Well, you can't teach an old dog new tricks," I said dryly. "Let's get one thing straight, pal. I. Don't. Harm. My. Friends." Each word brought more acid to my tone.

The next few moments seemed to go by in slow motion, though in reality I knew it was barely seconds. I saw Matthew's finger start to curl, and I pulled back the trigger on mine as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, Matthew's gun had already fired. I stood frozen in place, unable to move though my brain was screaming "RUN!"

Then out of nowhere, someone shoved me to the ground, covering my body with their own. As odd as it sounds, I heard the bullet hit flesh and knew my protector was hurt. I struggled to get whoever it was off me and my heart leapt when I saw it was Freddie.

"Freddie! Freddie, are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," I heard him say, but it sounded faraway, like a dream. I frantically looked around, remembering Matthew. He lay sprawled on the floor, blood pouring from his chest and pooled around him like a giant red puddle. It made me sick.

"We need to get you to a hospital," I told Freddie. He looked at his forearm.

"Nah, it barely grazed me. I'll be fine."

For the first time I remembered the other people in the library. "We gotta go," I said, pulling Freddie to his feet, careful of his arm.

XXX

Later, in Freddie's car, we were silent for a while.

"Hey Freddie?" I said after a couple of hours. He needed to know the truth.

"Yeah?"

"Remember that assassin organization you were telling me about? Yeah, I'm part of it. Or at least I was. And that guy I killed—Matthew. He trained me."

He didn't say anything, just stared straight ahead. I plowed on.

"They took me away after that fire at Bushwell. They trained me to be a better fighter. And a killer," I added bitterly. "So, I didn't really change my name to Amanda, that was just made up by them for the mission. And Freddie?"

I hesitated before my next words. "They wanted me to kill you," I whispered, and then broke down in tears. I angrily wiped them away. Freddie pulled me close with the arm not on the steering wheel, or at least as close as two people can get in a car, wrapping his arm around me in a comforting embrace with my head leaning on his shoulder.

"It's okay, Sam. I know it's not your fault," he said softly.

"I couldn't do it," I sobbed, no longer fighting the tears. "I couldn't kill you, no matter what I knew they'd do to me otherwise. I just couldn't."

"Shh. Shh, it's okay," he repeated, like a mantra.

"They were just testing me. They knew who you were, that I knew you, and they were seeing if I'd kill you or not. It's sick and wrong." By this point I was telling him things he probably had already heard me say, but I didn't care.

"Which is exactly why they have to be stopped." I nodded in agreement. I looked up at him, my face streaked with tears and probably filthy; I doubt I'd ever looked less attractive. But none of that mattered.

"Will you help me?"

"Of course," he murmured, stroking my hair.

I put my head back where it had been. "I love you," I told him, my voice muffled by his shoulder, uttering the words I never thought I would say to anybody as long as I lived.

"I love you too, Sam," he replied, and I could hear the smile in his voice, traced with just a hint of sadness.

**A/N: Okay, I promise I haven't disappeared off the face of the earth! Sorry about the wait. I was camping all during August, and I wrote this chapter out in my notebook, but I kept putting off typing it up. I've already got some ideas for the next chapter, so hopefully that won't be nearly as long. Though school just started for me on the 6****th****, and already I have to read **_**Great Expectations**_**.**

**Sorry for any mistakes, my beta's MIA at the moment so I didn't bother sending it to her first.**

**On another completely random note, the phrase "sick and wrong" always make me think of Ron on **_**Kim Possible**_**. I used to love that show. :)**


	8. Alliance

**I'm so, so sorry this took so long, guys. I only have high school and computer troubles to blame. My computer died on us, then we got a new one and I had to start over, then I got a laptop for Christmas and I didn't get a chance until last week to get the document from my desktop to my laptop. Then I had to send it to my beta. But you don't care.**

* * *

**Chapter Eight: Alliance**

_**Three Years Later**_

It's been three years: three long years of Freddie and I scanning every news article on the Internet and newspapers, searching for something, anything, that sounds like a hit from T.A. It's slow going, and we usually show up too late to make a difference. We're living in a safehouse, somewhere T.A. can never find us.

There are some days when I want to just give up. Give up all of it, and go live with Freddie on some tropical island somewhere. But then I remember how terrible T.A. is, and I become focused again. Still, a girl can dream, can't she?

If it weren't for Freddie, I worry that I might become clinically depressed or mad from loneliness. Or maybe I would really act upon my fantasies of getting out.

Still, it is tedious work, and not for the faint of heart or the weak. Carly or Amy, for instance, would never have been able to handle this life. Three years before I would have said the same about Freddie, but he's proving to be quite capable. Admittedly, before T.A. I'm not sure I could take it either.

The death of Matthew still haunts me, and of all the people I've killed, I see his face in my nightmares the most. It's recurring, nearly every night-I'm in a small room, with all of the people I've killed leering, grabbing at me; they all have blood where the gunshot was aimed, or a missing limb where I broke it, et cetera. And then the mob parts and Matthew's standing there, and we're back at T.A., and he's lecturing me. "You never should have done that, Sam," he always says, and then there's suddenly a hole in his chest and blood spurting out, but he doesn't even notice it, and then he takes out a gun and shoots me. He'll lean over me, still bleeding, and whisper, "You'll never win, Sammy." And that's always when I wake up, screaming and crying.

Freddie does his best to calm me when this happens. Usually, he can succeed; usually, I only need ham-or any meat will do, really-and his arms around me for a while, and eventually I'll probably fall back into a fitful, hopefully nightmare-free sleep. But there are some nights where there is nothing that can be done, when I just won't calm down, where I can't get back to sleep no matter what I do. Freddie will always, always stay up with me, no matter how tired he is.

And the next day I feel guilty that he lost sleep doing so. I'll try to make up for it in some small way, such as an attempt to make breakfast (though that was only once and _never again_). Freddie says I don't need to do anything, but I want to. It just never turns out quite the way I expect it to.

Tonight has been one of those Nights, the ones I have distinguished as having a capital _N_. We stay up and watch a movie. I'm not even sure what it is or what it's about, but it some sort of chick flick that was on TV that neither of us want to watch. Yet all of our attention is purposely, forcibly directed solely at the mindless comedy. And that's just why: because it is mindless. Getting my mind off of things tends to help me.

I'm not even aware of the time. It is very early in the morning, or maybe it is late at night depending on how you look at it. I'm cuddled into Freddie's chest, blankets and his arms wrapped around me, a mug of hot chocolate in my hands. The women on screen say something that's kind of funny and I make myself laugh.

I must have fallen asleep, because hours later, I awake to bright sunlight from the windows and a completely different movie, this one looking more like an action film. Freddie is still sleeping.

XXX

Six months later and no change in our routines. Today we were investigating what looks like a T.A. takedown in Boston, but of course, we got there too late. We walk through the streets, my feet trudging, not because I'm tired, but because I'm depressed about today's outcome. It's a pretty bad part of the city, and I'm on alert, ready to spring at anyone who tries to mug/rape/attack me. Though I doubt they will, since I've got a man walking with me. Criminals like that are usually put off if their intended target has someone with them who looks like they can fight. I know from experience.

Suddenly I see someone out of the corner of my eye, in an alley across the street from us. I quickly spin my head around to get a better look, but the person is gone. But I'm pretty sure I know who it is.

Without saying a word, I head into the alley. Freddie calls after me. "Where are you going?" he cries in a loud whisper, sounding panicked.

"I'll be right back," I tell him. "It's okay, don't worry," I add, though I know he will anyway. He follows me, as I expected.

I slowly go down the alley, my senses attuned to everything around me, my body a predator's ready to strike, or maybe the prey prepared to fight back. It just sounds better to say I'm a predator.

A person comes flying at me, trying to strike from behind. I had anticipated the attack and am ready. I duck, spin on my heel, and pop back up, lashing out with my foot, hitting my assailant square in the chest. She falls and is effectively knocked out. "Help me," I say to Freddie, and lift her by the shoulders. He takes her feet and we bring her back to our safehouse.

XXX

I notice movement as the girl begins to rustle, then her eyes fly open and her hand goes up to her head. She groans. "Ugh, what happened?" Then she notices me. "Who are you?"

"I'm Sam," I say calmly. "It's okay. I'm a...a friend." I say this knowing full well she won't believe it. I recognize the fear in her eyes, and how hard she's trying to hide it. I recognize where she's come from. Everything she's going through now, I went through. I understand.

She snorts. "Yeah, you wouldn't believe how many times I've heard that one."

"You'd be surprised."

She blows air out of her mouth in exasperation. "What do you _want_ from me?" By this point she has sat up and is sitting on the edge of the bed, hands at her sides gripping the mattress.

I hesitate for just a fraction of a second, decide to fill her in. "I know who killed your parents," I reveal.

I have her full attention now. "What?" she exclaims, jumping up; she begins ranting, so fast I can't even understand what she's saying. I let her go on for a minute, then get annoyed and yell the name I remember her to have: "Katania!" I snap.

She freezes. "H-how do you know my name?" she asks. Then a look of realization washes over her face. "Oh yeah. I forgot. You know who killed my parents, so you _must_ know my name too!" Her voice drips with venom. "And by the way, it's Kaitlyn now."

She must have changed it to make it sound more American. She's lost her Italian accent, too, I notice. Katania was a member of a wealthy family whose leader was a T.A. target, and the entire family had been killed in the process. Except for Katania-_Kaitlyn_. I had made sure of that. I don't tell her this last part though, only about T.A.  
"So you're working for them?" she sneers.

I shake my head. "Not anymore. I left them when I realized how terrible they are. They wanted me to kill someone I care very much about." She doesn't know about Freddie yet.

"Did you?"

"No."

"What happened to them?" I don't answer. She raises an eyebrow. "Well?"

"You'll find out soon enough." She looks confused but doesn't ask anything further on the subject. I'm walking around, and when my back is turned for just a moment, Kaitlyn instantly jumps up and attempts fleeing. I catch her by the wrist, and I'm stronger. I win. She cries out, screaming, a few tears falling down her face.

"_Ora vi ascoltarmi?_" I growl. "_Come non era del tutto evidente che hai appena mi tenere a parlare cosìè possibile eseguire, _Katania." She shrinks back at the Italian, a reminder of her former life. I had said "Now will you listen? Like it wasn't completely obvious you were just keeping me talking so you could run, Katania." Her eyes are big and she gives a slight nod.

I straighten. "Okay, so, like I was saying, Kaitlyn"—I shoot her a small smile—"T.A. is a horrible, cruel place and they must be taken down. I'd like you to help me, if you would."

She agrees.

XXX

I go with her as she explores our safehouse. The first room she visits is the kitchen, where she finds Freddie. "Hi," she squeaks.

He gets up and holds his hand out for her to shake. "I'm Freddie."

"Kaitlyn." She still has that wide-eyed, amazed look of a fangirl meeting their favorite celebrity. She turns to me. "Is he…" I nod. I open the fridge and pull out some Canadian bacon. I rip pieces off, about half of the slice each time.

"You're really eating ham right now?" Freddie asks, amused.

"It's always time for ham!" I tell him, tearing off another bite. Kaitlyn smiles at our bickering. I keep going with the tour, bringing the ham with me. Freddie and I do occasional commentary and answer any questions Kaitlyn has.

XXX

That night, Freddie and I are in bed. "So you really think this thing with Kaitlyn will work?" he says.

"They killed her parents," I say softly. "That's enough. If someone ever killed you…well, what I would to do them…it would be the worst pain a person can go through." He is quiet as he sinks this in.

My back is to him, but I know he is lying halfway between his back and his side, propping himself up by the elbows, facing towards me. I feel him shift and he wraps his arms around me and kisses my neck.

"Thank you, Sammy," he says. It is a name he only calls me in moments of great intimacy such as this, and he's the only person I ever allow to call me it. "If we've got any luck at all, neither of us will ever have to do that."

This indirect way of saying he'd do the same thing is enough for me.

* * *

**Oh wow, how cheesy was that last line?**

** So what do you guys think of Katania/Kaitlyn? I felt like this story needed something new, so ta-da! Alex's T.A. counterpart, from Italy. I want to go to Italy someday which is why I picked it. I'm also part Italian.**


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